2001 Results

Out of 12 runners, Mike Tilden and Blake Wood finished at Blank
Cabin within the 60 hour cutoff. In addition, John Robinson and
Jim Nelson finished 14 summits (to Shavano) within the 60 hours.
They did this without stopping to sleep, climbing Missouri, Belford,
and Oxford during the first night, and Princeton during the second
night. John Robinson took the lead on the second day, but at night
the runners stuck together. Mike Tilden took the lead on day 3
to win in 58:51, followed by Blake Wood in 59:38.

Weather was very good, with a strong west wind bringing in
cool, dry air and no thunderstorms on the first day. There was a
brief 20 minute snowstorm on the second day around 5 PM.
and localized thunderstorms on the third evening around
7 PM after the run ended.

Generally, the route taken by most runners was as follows.
Routes by Roach are described in his book, Colorado's Fourteeners,
2nd ed.

Massive (14421 ft) from the Fish Hatchery (9600 ft)
via Highline Trail to treeline, then
up east ridge (Roach 9.7) on tundra, descend west slope on scree and
tundra to treeline (Roach 9.4) to South Halfmoon Creek trailhead
(10240 ft) aid station.

Steve Bremner and Laila Hughes were married on Princton, Steve's last
summit, at 4 PM Saturday, 58 hours into the run. They had planned to
marry on Shavano but the course was tougher than he expected.
Ginny LaForme and Eric Robinson had reached Princeton 1-2 hours before
and stayed to attend the wedding.

Dennis "animal" Herr ran a hard pace, but took long sleep breaks
and only made it as far as Yale. After climbing the first 4 summits
with Steve Bremner, they radioed from the summit of Huron at 10:35 PM
to inquire about sleeping accomodations at Cloises Lake. They had
none, so they backtracked to Winfield and slept from 1AM to 8AM.
From there they took the road to Missouri Gulch and climbed Missouri,
Belford, Oxford, Harvard, and Columbia in daylight.
On the second night, Dennis stopped at N. Cottonwood from midnight
until dawn while Steve continued without sleep, climbing Yale
in the dark and Princeton the following day for the wedding.
Dennis climbed Yale with Matt Mahoney in the morning, reaching the
summit shortly after 10 AM, then calling it quits.

Matt Mahoney reached La Plata as darkness fell, and slept from
11:30 PM to 3:30 AM at Winfield in order to do the difficult descent
of Huron in daylight. He climbed Missouri, Belford, and Oxford before
darkness fell again while climbing Harvard. He did not sleep on the
second night, getting lost and taking a difficult route over rocks
between Harvard
and Columbia in the moonless night. After climbing Yale the next day,
he continued on to Princeton but only climbed as far as 12500 ft before
the 6 PM cutoff. He still had to traverse the summit to reach the east
ridge trail to be picked up, but lost the trail during the descent after
dark on the third night and had to traverse dangerously loose
boulders on a steep ridge
for about 2 hours until he found the trail and was picked up at 10:30 PM.

Hans Dieter Weisshaar was about an hour behind Matt until Missouri,
which they climbed together. Hans was suffering from pulmonary edema
and was climbing very slowly, so he dropped out at Missouri Gulch
and returned the next morning to finish Belford, Oxford, Harvard, and
Columbia.

Steve Simmons took a long break after climbing Massive with
Ginny, Eric, and Matt, then took a wrong turn down Elbert and had
to bushwack down a draw between the Black Cloud and Echo Canyon trails.
He then left the course and returned at noon the next day to continue
without crew or aid station support. He climbed La Plata in daylight,
then Huron and Missouri at night. Near the summit of Missouri his
only flashlight went out and he had to sleep on the summit with just
a space blanket. The next morning, out of water, he climbed Belford
and Oxford and descended to Pine Creek, out of FRS radio range of
the volunteers and other runners. From there he hiked 20 miles
south on the Colorado Trail until the first road crossing (CO 306)
and hitchhiked to the race headquarters in Buena Vista a few miles away.

Simon Shadowlight was far behind the other runners, climbing La Plata
at midnight and reaching Winfield at sunrise and Huron at noon. From
there he descended to Cloises Lake (now unmanned) and left the course
to sleep. He continued unofficially the next day to climb Missouri,
Belford, and Oxford from Missouri Gulch without aid.

The following results are as of Aug. 29, 2001 by Jon McManus.
These are unofficial and not yet complete. See notes below.